Gust van de Wall Perné:
Vrouw schrikt van een kikker
[Woman scared by a frog] (1887 - 1911)

More Abundant Than Strictly Necessary
This writing week was a genuine embarrassment of riches. The apricot tree's fruit finally ripened, always a momentous happening. It produces more fruit than any ten families could reasonably consume. I realized I still needed to purchase a tall ladder to reach the highest branches. This fruit ripens first and plummets to the ground or onto anyone passing beneath. This fruit seems almost liquid, splatting in joyous reunion with gravity and Earth. I spend some time each morning shagging fallen cots, collecting their smeared carcasses before interring them in the compost heap. The world seems too alive by at least half, and The Muse and I rush to try to keep up, a fool's mission, a cherished task. This world seems more abundant than strictly necessary, extravagant, and ultimately wasteful. It specializes in conspicuous production, so we might specialize in conspicuous consumption. The homegrown heirloom tomatoes even started coming on. Harvest should continue uninterrupted until after Autumn arrives.

Weekly Writing Summary

I began my writing week disclosing how I account for my audience in *TottingUp. This posting proved the period's most popular. "I average about seven hundred such touches per week, a hundred a day, give or take, and I find these numbers curiously reassuring. I understand that they amount to cowboy calculus, bullshit powered with windage, but they still produce a palpable swell of pride in my chest."

Unknown Artist:
Daikon Radish and Accounting Book (19th century)

“Data-Driven crazy …”
—
I noticed a kid holding his cell phone at half-arm's length as if following a handheld North Star in ZombieLand. "I imagine our post-modern counterpart missing his adventures, for he seemed pre-distracted, not nearly present enough to experience anything more than what I suspect were compelling Tic-Tok® videos. He prefaces a ZombieLand, which might represent the future of labor, where leisure and labor so seamlessly interact that we no longer experience that longing for time away from our professions while we so invisibly slip in and out that nobody hardly notices our passages, not even ourselves."

Hablot Knight Browne:
The Broken Cart-Rope
(n.d.-mid-nineteenth century)
—
I described my recent experiences with discomfort, wondering aloud if I had been experiencing RealPain. I experimented with doing the opposite of what the doctor had prescribed, an Anything But That! "Rather than nurse myself in idleness, I did precisely the opposite of what the doctor had prescribed. Sometimes, an Anything But That! turns out to be just what the doctor should have ordered."

Theodore Lane: Champagne verdrijft de pijn
[Champagne driving away real pain] (1825 - 1826)

"Waiting seems the worse sort of RealPain."
—
I noticed that I tend to catch myself doing something wrong more often than I ever notice myself doing anything right, a process I labeled Wronging. "I do not practice in pursuit of perfection but pursuing perfection's opposite."

Hans Weiditz (II):
Behaarde man kruipt door een bos
[Hairy man crawls through a forest] (1514 - 1531)

" … without expecting to eventually avoid making more."
—
I divorced a publisher before we signed contracts. This reminded me of the absolute importance of developing skill in CuttingCords. "CuttingCords tends to be irreversible, and since none of us can foresee any future, it inevitably alters a course. No do-overs when it comes to CuttingCords. It's a statement of growing faith in a future yet undiscovered over a present proven unpromising at dreaming, a magic bean chosen over a disappointing cow."

Jan Harmensz. Muller:
Creation of the World: Day One,
separation of light from dark (1589)

"I might regret the radical act, but later."
—
I took a side trip from my Honing efforts to consider secrets, best-kept as well and the WorstKept kind. "When riled, the world turns on a rusty axis that can make quite a racket. It was the WorstKept secret that defiled, not the disclosure."

Unknown artist (German) or William Kent
Two Travelers under Tree
with Village and Bridge in Distance (1707)

"Thanks ever so much for finally …"
—
I ended my writing week wondering how Honing might happen, given that repetitions tends to be less than perfect Pairings. "It's a genuine wonder that anyone ever improves anything since each iteration poorly mirrors every prior one. There's little repetition to leverage. This principle probably holds equally true whatever the content, whatever the context."

Bernhardt Wall: Sunbonnet twins baking. (1906)

" … just like every other Pairing of The Muse and her surroundings …"
—

This writing week might have been another microcosm, just like every one before. I do not know until looking in my rearview mirror come Friday what my experience might mean, but then the insight tends to come. It's fresh regardless of how many times it has previously visited. Each week seems so much the same in retrospect and so mysterious when still unfolding. I do my accounting and cowboy calculus, interspersed with frequent visits into and back out of ZombieLand. I wonder if my aches and pains are real, only sure that I hold a well-developed sense of how wrong I tend to perform. I gained some more experience in CuttingCords and in spilling some WorstKept secrets. I ended the week by Pairing my performance with my historical record and finding it identical. One day my audience might abandon my stories for something less repetitive. I seem capable of only learning the same lessons again and again and again. There might only ever be one lesson to learn, and it must be continuously relearned. Thanks for following along!

©2023 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #Honing, #PureSchmaltz